The Last Ballad(70)
“Okay,” Katherine said.
“Because I think it’s important that we all do our part to help young people like Grace Ingle, young people who are doing everything in their power—” But his words trailed away and silence reclaimed the space where his voice had been. Katherine thought about the speech he had delivered as the doctored cakes were being served. When he’d been called to speak his face had turned slightly pink, flushed with either liquor or embarrassment, and when he stood he’d held the tips of her fingers in one hand and a flute of sparkling cider in the other. His speech had sounded like so much of what he was saying to her now—“When I think of today’s youth”—but Katherine had simply watched her husband speak as if he were on the other side of the glass dome that she now imagined had closed her off from the world. She could see him, but she wasn’t quite able to hear him.
It wasn’t until much later in his speech that Richard had let go of her fingers and walked around to the other side of the table, where Claire and Paul were sitting.
“And Claire,” he said, “you are the finest young person I’ve ever known. Your mother and I had only one child, and I cannot express to you how happy, proud, and thankful we are that that child is you.”
As the audience broke into applause, Katherine had lifted her napkin to her eyes to hide her tears. Richard came back around the table and placed his hand on her shoulder, and then she felt his breath against her ear when he kissed the side of her face.
The rain had begun to bead on her window, and Katherine listened as Richard resumed his talk about young people.
“Not all of them will be able to afford college like we’ve afforded it,” he said. “No, they won’t all have dinners and parties and weddings like the one Claire and Paul are going to have.”
It must have been his mention of her name that alerted Richard to the fact that their daughter was not with them. He turned and looked over his shoulder and saw that the backseat was empty.
“Where’s Claire?”
“Out,” Katherine said.
“Out where?”
“I don’t know,” she said. “Out. She wanted to be with Paul and her friends.”
Richard sighed as if he were disappointed that it had only been Katherine and not Claire too who’d witnessed his second impassioned speech of the evening. He clearly had much to say about “today’s youth.”
“You’d think she’d want a few more nights at home with us before the big day.”
“Why would we think that?” Katherine asked. “Why? Her life is changing. It’s already changed. Everything is changing. Why doesn’t anyone understand that?”
They passed the lake in the center of the village, the fountain at its middle pulsing with life. Across the water, the mill shone in the night like an enormous ship. Katherine thought of Edison’s Dynamo #31, its heart pumping mindlessly, giving life to it all.
After these many years in McAdamville, she’d tired of the legend of Edison’s trip to the village, during which he’d personally installed the dynamo in the mill, and she reminded herself of all the other things Edison worked to invent: the telegraph, the lightbulb, the phonograph. She remembered reading that Edison had envisioned that his phonograph would be used to record messages, last wills and testaments, the voices of loved ones so they could speak to us for eternity.
Katherine had been seven years old the first time she heard music on a phonograph. She and her father had been standing on the porch of Tipton’s Grocery back in Hickory when someone set up the player. Once the music began, a song called “Daisy Bell,” a crowd of people had gathered to listen. Katherine held her father’s hand, and with her other hand she held a cold bottle of limeade. A hen with several chicks scratched in the dirt just beyond the bottom of the steps. It was summer, dusty and dry. She watched the chicks and wanted to touch one of them, but she didn’t want to let go of her father’s hand, and she didn’t want to set the limeade on the porch floor for fear of it being overturned.
Katherine closed her eyes and leaned her head against the car’s window and thought of the little girl she had been and considered how much of her life she would change if she could. What message would she record and leave behind for the little girl who would grow up to be her? Perhaps none of this will happen, Katie, she would tell her. Perhaps all of it will happen.
Katherine opened her eyes, looked out at the dark, empty streets of McAdamville, saw the well-kept yards that fronted the small brick homes. Richard had always relished passing through the village at night when the streets were quiet. It allowed him to slow down and enjoy it without anyone witnessing his admiration of his own family’s legacy.
“Perhaps we should’ve hosted tonight’s party here in McAdamville so the Lytles could see how the best mills are run,” he said. “And what the best mill villages look like.”
They crested the hill above the village and followed the gravel driveway toward the old house, the few lights they’d left on winking at them through the wet trees. Richard pulled the Essex into the garage.
Katherine let herself into the house through the back door and followed the long hallway past the kitchen and turned left into the sitting room. She turned on the light and kneeled before the cabinet atop which the phonograph sat. She opened the cabinet’s doors and thumbed through the many records they’d collected over the years. She found the one she was looking for, and she stood and took the stairs up to their bedroom. She heard the back door open and close. Richard’s footsteps echoed from the hallway below her.